Birmingham Hippodrome has done it again this year, pulling out all the stops for a Christmas pantomime that serves as an exemplar for the genre.
The production company, Qdos Entertainment have once again employed the services of the charismatic Matt Slack, the very model of a modern pantomime comedian, to take the audience on a madcap dash through one of the nation’s favourite fairy tales, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Co-writing with Alan McHugh and under the direction of Michael Harrison, Slack’s interpretation of the classic story is very muddled. No wonder, then, he plays Snow White’s faithful friend, Muddles. Yes, you’ve got it, the theme for the show is to make it up as you go along. But it is made up brilliantly, with an abundance of lightning quick ad lib and living-in-the-moment wit.
Matt Slack leads a diverse cast of entertainers. The first group we meet are The Magnificent Seven, a group of dwarf actors who win the audience over from the outset with humour and witty banter. Another group hired in especially for the show are Flawless, who are the Praetorian Guard to the evil Queen Dragonella. This street dance collective, stars of TV’s Britain Got Talent, performed some power-charged choreography with impressive energy and gymnastic precision. Surely, Lesley Joseph would be safe as the evil queen with these eight muscular heavyweights to protect her? Alas, no one is safe when Slack’s around, and Ms Joseph had no choice but to resort to being a good sport in response to his outrageous antics.
The singing performances were strong too, with X Factor winner Joe McElderry performing as The Spirit of the Mirror. It is well known that he can belt out a tune or two and he did not disappoint. Not only has he a quality voice, he was also spot on in his analysis on who had claim to the accolade “the fairest of them all”. Faye Brooks as Snow White was as easy on the eye as she was on the ear, and their voices blended beautifully.
While on the subject of beauty, let us not forget Snow White’s Nanny, Annie Aspirin played by Andrew Ryan, or the Queen’s Lady in Waiting, Doreen Tipton. Both brought something different to the role of a pantomime dame. Ryan performed in the traditional style, in drag wearing a variety of crazy over-the-top costumes. What this lacked in originality, Ryan made up for in wit with a well-developed repertoire of risqué innuendo, just enough for the children to know he was being naughty but not so much as to comprehend the meaning. Tipton played her dame in her own unique deadpan style, with her distinctive regional accent and turn of phrase. Personally, I loved her performance, though I wonder if anyone outside the West Midlands would understand her or get the Black Country humour. She was safe in Birmingham though, where the usual crowd-pleasing local references to Midland’s towns and the city’s districts were thrown in at regular intervals.
Such references were important to for the Royalty in the area, by which I mean Prince Harry of Harbourne, Snow White’s suitor. Despite not being famous enough to get his name on the poster – not my words, but those of Mr Slack in one of his on-the-spot put downs – Jac Yarrow put in a good supporting performance, demonstrating why he was chosen to play the London Palladium recently as Joseph in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. However, one wonders if even that dreamcoat was enough to prepare him for the costumes on display in this production. There were simply too many delightfully over-the-top outfits to describe, but if there was ever a shimmer, glimmer and sparkle deficit in the World, the wardrobe of this show could rectify it.
The high-end budget that the wardrobe department conveyed was typical of some tremendous and dazzling production values all around. The ensemble and the orchestra were on point, and there were pyrotechnics, set and staging and lighting designs to entertain and delight, not to mention a couple of truly spectacular special effects to give the show the ‘wow-factor’. Rather than let me spoil them here with description, this is a pantomime for you to go to see for yourself. ★★★★★ Robert Gainer 23rd December 2019
